on the continent. The conquest itself became a grand theme for their muse. RICHARD WACE. First among the Anglo-Norman poets stands Richard Wace, called Maistre Wace, reading clerk, (clerc lisant,) born in the island of Jersey, about 1112, died in 1184. His works are especially to be noted for the direct. and indirect history they contain. His first work, which ap-. peared about 1138, is entitled Le Brut d'Angleterre - The English Brutus-and is in part a paraphrase of the Latin history of Geoffrey of Monmouth, who had presented Brutus of Troy as the first in the line of British kings. Wace has preserved the fiction of Geoffrey, and has catered to that characteristic of the English people which, not content with homespun myths, sought for genealogies from the remote classic times. Wace's Brut is chiefly in octo-syllabic verse, and extends to fifteen thousand lines. But Wace was a courtier, as well as a poet. Not content with pleasing the fancy of the English people with a fabulous royal lineage, he proceeded to gratify the pride of their Norman masters by writing, in 1171, his "Roman de Rou, et des Ducs de Normandie," an epic poem on Rollo, the first Duke of Normandy - Rollo, called the Marcher, because he was so mighty of stature that no horse could bear his weight. This Rollo compromised with Charles the Simple of France by marrying his daughter, and accepting that tract of Neustria to which he gave the name of Normandy. He was the ancestor, at six removes, of William the Conqueror, and his mighty deeds were a pleasant and popular subject for the poet of that day, when a great-grandson of William, Henry II., was upon the throne of England. The Roman de Rou contains also the history of Rollo's successors: it is in two parts; the first extending to the beginning of the reign of the third duke, Richard the Fearless, and the second, containing the story of the conquest, comes down to the time of Henry II. himself. The second part he wrote rapidly, for fear that he would be forestalled by the king's poet Benoit. The first part was written in Alexandrines, but for the second he adopted the easier measure of the octo-syllabic verse, of which this part contains seventeen thousand lines. In this poem are discerned the craving of the popular mind, the power of the subject chosen, and the reflection of language and manners, which are displayed on every page. So popular, indeed, was the subject of the Brut, indigenous as it was considered to British soil, that Wace's poem, already taken from Geoffrey of Monmouth, as Geoffrey had taken it, or pretended to take it from the older chronicle, was soon again, as we shall see, to be versionized into English. OTHER NORMAN WRITERS OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY. Philip de Than, about 1130, one of the Trouvères: Li livre de créatures is a poetical study of chronology, and his Bestiarie is a sort of natural history of animals and minerals. Benoit Chroniques des Ducs de Normandie, 1160, written in thirty thousand octo-syllabic verses, only worthy of a passing notice, because of the appointment of the poet by the king, (Henry II.,) in order to forestall the second part of Wace's Roman de Rou. Geoffrey, died 1146: A miracle play of St. Catherine. Geoffrey Gaimar, about 1150: Estorie des Engles, (History of the English.) Luc de la Barre, blinded for his bold satires by the king (Henry I.). Mestre Thomas, latter part of twelfth century: Roman du Roi Horn. Probably the original of the "Geste of Kyng Horn.” Richard I., (Coeur de Lion,) died 1199, King of England: Sirventes and songs. His antiphonal song with the minstrel Blondel is said to have given information of the place of his imprisonment, and procured his release; but this is probably only a romantic fiction. OORE, in his beautiful poem, "The Light of the Harem," speaks of that luminous pulsation which precedes the real, progressive morning: that earlier dawn Whose glimpses are again withdrawn, As if the morn had waked, and then The simile is not inapt, as applied to the first efforts of the early English, or Semi-Saxon literature, during the latter part of the twelfth and the whole of the thirteenth century. That deceptive dawn, or first glimpse of the coming day, is to be found in the work of Layamon. The old Saxon had revived, but had been modified and altered by contact with the Latin chronicles and the Anglo-Norman poetry, so as to become a distinct language that of the people; and in this language men of genius and poetic taste were now to speak to the English nation. LAYAMON. Layamon1 was an English priest of Worcester 1 Craik says, (i. 198,) "Or, as he is also called, Laweman- for the old character represented in this instance by our modern y, is really only a shire, who made a version of Wace's Brut, in the beginning of the thirteenth century, so peculiar, however, in its language, as to puzzle the philologist to fix its exact date with even tolerable accuracy. But, notwithstanding its resemblance, according to Mr. Ellis, to the "simple and unmixed, though very barbarous Saxon," the character of the alphabet and the nature of the rhythm place it at the close of the twelfth century, and present it as perhaps the best type of the Semi-Saxon. The poem consists partly of the Saxon alliterative lines, and partly of verses which seem to have thrown off this trammel; so that a different decision as to its date would be reached according as we consider these diverse parts of its structure. It is not improbable that, like English poets of a later time, Layamon affected a certain archaism in language, as giving greater beauty and interest to his style. The subject of the Brut was presented to him as already treated by three authors: first, the original Celtic poem, which has been lost; second, the Latin chronicle of Geoffrey; and, third, the French poem of Wace. Although Layamon's work is, in the main, a translation of that of Wace, he has modified it, and added much of his own. His poem contains more than thirty thousand lines. THE ORMULUM. - Next in value to the Brut of Layamon, is the Ormulum, a series of metrical homilies, in part paraphrases of the gospels for the day, with verbal additions and annotations. This was the work of a monk named Orm or Ormin, who lived in the beginning of the thirteenth century, during the reign of King John and Henry III., and it resembles our present English much more nearly than the poem of Layamon. In his dedication of the work to his brother Walter, Orm says-and we give his words as an illustration of the language in which he wrote: guttural, (and by no means either a j or a z,) by which it is sometimes rendered." Marsh says, "Or, perhaps, Lagamon, for we do not know the sound of y in this name." Icc hafe don swa summ thu bad Affterr thatt little witt tatt me I have done so as thou bade, After that little wit that me The poem is written in Alexandrine verses, which may be divided into octo-syllabic lines, alternating with those of six syllables, as in the extract given above. He is critical with regard to his orthography, as is evinced in the following instructions which he gives to his future readers and transcriber: And whase willen shall this booke And whoso shall wish this book Him bidde ice that he 't write right Him bid I that he it write right, The critics have observed that, whereas the language of Layamon shows that it was written in the southwest of England, that of Orm manifests an eastern or northeastern origin. To the historical student, Orm discloses the religious condition and needs of the people, and the teachings of the Church. His poem is also manifestly a landmark in the history of the English language. ROBERT OF GLOUCESTER. - Among the rhyming chroniclers of this period, Robert, a monk of Gloucester Abbey, is noted for his reproduction of the history of Geoffrey of Monmouth, already presented by Wace in French, and by Layamon in Saxon-English. But he is chiefly valuable in that he carries the chronicle forward to the end of the reign of Henry III. Written in West-country English, it not only contains a strong infusion of French, but distinctly states the prevailing influence of that language in his own day: Vor bote a man couthe French, me tolth of him well lute |